Sims Big Brother

Sims Big Brother is a competition-reality show based on the IRL series Big Brother. The show has premiered on April 9, 2015 on SimsTV.

The show largely follows the format of the North American versions of the show, which typically involves more competitions and strategy. Week by week, houseguests are voted out by their peers until one remains. The last houseguest remaining wins a grand prize of $250,000 while the runner up wins $50,000 and the Fan Favorite wins $25,000.

The series was hosted on The Sims 3 until it's ninth season when it moved to The Sims 4.

The seventh season of the series was given an "All Stars" theme and featured a full cast of returning players, becoming the second season to feature returning players and the first to feature an entire cast of returning players. Season 8 became the first in the series to introduce a "reunion" episode. As of August 2020, the series has been renewed for seasons 12 and 13.

Renewals
The series first started being promoted in September 2014 with casting opening on September 30. On November 1, casting was closed and the season went into production. Production on the first season wrapped in early April 2015 and promos for the season began in March. The cast was revealed on April 2, 2015 with a house tour being revealed on April 3. On June 11, 2015, it was announced that the series was renewed for a second season and casting opened that day. Casting closed on October 31 with the season going into production. On January 20, 2016, it was announced that the series had been renewed for a third season and that the series would air two seasons per year, one in late winter/early spring (typically following a February - April schedule), and one in late summer/early fall (typically following an August - October schedule). Production on season two wrapped in March 2016. Casting for the third season opened on February 12 along with the premiere of the second season and closed on April 15 (the same day as the season two finale) with production beginning soon after. The series then began to follow a "schedule" where casting calls for a future season would open the same day as a season premiere, and would close on the day of the finale with production on the season starting soon after. This schedule remained until the summer of 2018, when seasons 7-8 were filmed back to back, production did not need to open a new casting call for season 8 as season 7 featured an all returnee cast. On April 9, 2019, the series was prematurely renewed for a tenth season and a separate casting call was opened and closed on May 31. In the summer of 2019, seasons 9-10 were filmed back to back. The seasons were however, filmed out of order for unknown reasons, yet were aired in order. Season 11 was announced on August 9, 2019 with the premiere of the ninth season and casting opened that same day. Casting closed on February 14, 2020 along with the premiere of the tenth season and the season went into production in March. The show was renewed for seasons 12 & 13 on August 14, 2020 and was to return to a normal schedule with casting calls for season 12 opening that day. Production was unexpectedly halted due to unknown reasons and on November 1, 2020 it was announced that production on the twelfth season is set to begin in January 2021 with casting calls closing on New Year's Day.

Switch to The Sims 4
On July 15, 2019, it was announced that the series would move to The Sims 4 starting with the series' ninth season.

Hosts
The first season was hosted by Violet Monroe of the SimsTV reality series Keeping Up With The Monroes. On January 20, 2016, it was announced that she would be replaced by Isabella Wright (going by Isabella Elmore until her marriage in 2018). Wright continues to host to this day.

Twists
Over the course of the series, the game has offered many different "twists" to change the game in one way or another. In season two, "have-nots" were made to be safe for the week, providing a battle between wanting to be safe or wanting to be comfortable. This twist was brought back in season 4 and became a regular for the series until it was dropped again in season 9. Another modification to the original format was that all houseguests were eligible to participate in the Power of Veto competition. This twist was dropped in season 8 in favor of picking players to participate instead. In season 4, seven players from the previous three seasons had returned to the game for a second chance at the game, tying into the seasons theme of "past, present, and future." In season 5, thirteen houseguests originally entered the house. What was unknown to the houseguests was that a set of twins were playing the game as one person, routinely switching places in the Diary Room. If the twins made it past five evictions, they would win a cash prize of $10,000 and would be able to play as two separate players. The 7th season was given an "All Stars" theme and featured a cast of all returning players. In season 8, the "Roulette Power of Veto" was introduced, giving it's holder the power to use it within the next three weeks after obtaining it, but it's outcome would be uncertain. In season 10, the secret room of powers was introduced, giving players who won a secret competition the choice of choosing between one of the game altering powers. In season 11, the "Icy Power of Veto" was introduced. It would would be won via a secret scavenger hunt. It gave it's holder the power to use it until the final 4, when used, the houseguest who was not taken off of the block would name the replacement nominee. In season 12, the biggest cast in the series history was introduced, consisting of twenty houseguests, the houseguests were split in half with 10 houseguests going into two separate houses. The groups of ten were unaware that there was another house or houseguests competing alongside them until day 36, when the twist was revealed during a live eviction episode, a construction crew worked on merging the two houses as they competed in their first Head of Household competition as one house.